One Wish
by crazykitsune17
Summary: If you could have one wish, what would it be and why? The Yu Yu characters attempt to answer this question in a collection of essays. Please read, review and offer concrit. Chapter 5 up!
1. Chapter 1

**One Wish**

_by crazykitsune17_

Disclaimer: I have put my hand on a Bible and sworn under oath that I do not own Yu Yu Hakusho.

**-X-**

I regret many things in my life. I regret the crimes and sins I have committed. I regret keeping secrets from my human mother. I regret hurting anyone, whether they were my friends or not. I don't like to fight and argue; I prefer peaceful negotiation, but it seems as if I am almost always alone in that matter. Many of my attempts at peace turn into bloody melees.

I often fear that I may come off as conceited or snobbish, and this would be one of those times. I believe that I am a tolerant man. I do not judge, I do not hate, not even those who hurt me, and I am not prejudiced against anyone of mankind nor spirit or demonkind. I believe I'm respectable in that aspect, and I believe that it is a pity if you find such a trait disgraceful.

While I also believe that remembering is important, a part of me strongly believes that forgetting is a blissful experience. If I could so choose, I would like to forget not my memories of the past, but my regrets that come with them. Memories are what help you learn and grow as a person; regrets are what impede your growth. Without regret, success and happiness can be achieved much more easily.

I won't lie that many things come easily to me – my affinity and talent with botany and my schoolwork for example – and that my creator needed to bestow upon me roadblocks. However, regret is a heavy, painful roadblock, burdening me every single day and occasionally haunting my dreams at night. Keeping the regret from consuming me taxes my energy greatly. With a memory of so hundreds of years' worth of regrets, it is quite often difficult to remain as optimistic as I am.

I do not wish for anyone's pity on my centuries of sins and current regret. No, my one wish – or perhaps two wishes, as the selfish man that I am suggests – is for me to be able to forget and for others to have tolerance.

Tolerance is necessary not only in the human world, but in the other two worlds as well. If creatures were more tolerant of others, there would certainly much less tension between people of different races, ethnicities, colors, powers, etc. The relationship between the Makai and the living world would not be as unstable as it is – and unfortunately always will be – now. The relationship between men would be one of peace.

I am so sick of war. I'm tired of fighting. I live to protect my land, the entire world and all of its beauty, yet it's difficult and depressing work. With each triumph over evil, there is always loss. Whether it is the simple loss of blood or the weightier loss of a friend, there is always loss. That is why I wish for tolerance. With tolerance there is no loss in battles and wounded pride. With tolerance there is no regret for failure of a victory. With tolerance my life would be perfect.

On second thought, is there not a reason why humans are not granted wishes? We tend to think impulsively and wish for selfish reasons, yet even when we try to think of others in our well-wishing, we only end up losing sight of what life is all about.

Life is about struggle. It is about remembering and forgetting, despising and tolerating, loving and hating. Life is not about achieving perfection. Life is about learning to live with one's own imperfections – as well as the world's – and not dwelling upon affairs that are out of one's power to change, though who am I to say what life is all about? Not even the great rulers of heaven and hell know what life is all about. How pretentious I am for attempting to make such a persuasive suggestion.

How pretentious are you to ask me of what I would wish when it is clearly certain that I cannot wish anything at all?

**-X-**

-crazykitsune17-


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: Thank you very much for the reviews! I'm so relieved I got Kurama down well – thanks for the affirmation, guys! Anyway, for those of you deciding to keep up with this story, I will typically update on weekends since school and work keep me plenty busy during the week – just so you know when to look for new updates. Please keep going with your awesome reviews, I really appreciate them!

**One Wish**

_by crazykitsune17_

Disclaimer: If I had a dollar for every time I've said that I don't own Yu Yu Hakusho, I'd be a rich girl. Maybe even rich enough to actually buy YYH from Togashi-sama himself… Or maybe not.

**-X-**

If I could have one wish, what would it be and why? I'd wish for the world to have an honor code! Seriously, it's disgusting the way the world works nowadays. We have men against men, men against women, men against themselves. Every single day I see a fight of some kind – and not an honest fight, either, like the one me and Urameshi like to have once in a while. There's junior high kids beating on ten-year-olds, big huge guys beating on small, defenseless women. Like I said, the world is disgusting.

There is nothing more sickening that a man without honor. A world without honor is billions of times more sickening. In just my hometown alone, there are sleazeballs who lurk in street corners, seducing or bribing women or children into sex, greedy bastards whose only care in the world is money, and parents who don't care about their children. There are guys who kick puppies, guys who hit girls, and guys who steal, cheat, and lie. There are even more of these kinds of people in Japan and also the world!

Now I'm not saying that I hate the world or anything, I'm just saying that some people are real scum. I would know; nearly every single guy I've fought was scum. If these guys, my opponents, even had half of an honor code, they'd be much better men.

There are some men that are born without honor. These guys are bad, but people who acquire dishonorable traits over time are even worse. There is nothing more rotten than a friend turning his back on the people who care about him for money, power, or just plain cowardice. I tend to be a good judge of character if I don't say so myself, so thankfully none of my friends have ever ditched me, and I trust them – even Hiei! – never to do so. If the rest of the world had friends like mine, maybe there wouldn't be so much cruelty and crime.

Sometimes people ask, "How do you do it, Kuwabara? Keep up that whole honor code thing? Isn't it hard not to lie or cheat or be a jerk to somebody?" The answer is no, 'cos I'm a man. Real men don't need to lie or cheat or be a jerk. Real men don't need to hurt innocent people to make themselves feel better. Real men can do their own work instead of cheating, and real men don't need to be fake and macho just to gain some respect and appreciation. Being an honest, hardworking, trustworthy man accomplish that. Having respect and knowing the fact that you're a good man should be and are reward enough for sticking to a few basic, moral principles, and that's why and how I keep to my code.

If the world had an honor code, there wouldn't be any fighting or sick cruelty. There wouldn't be a multitude of sleazy, money-hungry monsters. Nobody would feel worthless, ashamed, or inferior. We'd have a world full of respectable men – and women – who don't put others down to make themselves feel good, who don't start fights and wars without first finding a better way, who don't cheat and swindle their way to success.

If the rest of the world found something to believe in – like righteousness or love rather than money and power – there wouldn't be anything wrong with this world.

I've found my thing to believe in. I believe in honor, I believe in love – after all, I found Yukina! How can I not believe in love? – and I believe in the pursuit of all things just. If the rest of the world could just adopt something similar to my code, wouldn't that be the perfect wish?

**-X-**

-crazykitsune17-


	3. Chapter 3

A/N: Sorry that these keep on getting shorter… Sometimes I guess I just run out of things to say. Odd… Anyway, thank you for being patient, so here is your next installment. Please review.

**One Wish**

_by crazykitsune17_

Disclaimer: YYH not mine. Solve for "H".

**-X-**

Oh dear, I hope this doesn't sound too trite, but if I could have one wish, I would wish for everyone to find love.

It's such a simple word, love. Four letters in English, two characters in Japanese. It's amazing how a word that tiny packs a meaning so large. And yet not everybody seems to find it.

As an apparition of death, I meet many people who have died without love – and some who have even killed themselves because of it. It's terribly sad. A lonesome young woman on her way to the next world, told me of how she had loved someone back on earth – "So much it was slowly killing me, eating me from the inside," she said – and yet he had never loved her back. They had married, yes, "but the vows meant nothing."

"He would come home drunk every night and beat me. He would never tell me he loved me. We slept in the same bed only once. His kisses tasted like alcohol and other women's' lipstick. While we were dating, it was wonderful – he was kind and gentle and loving. I don't know what happened, but I had to end it, and this was the only way I knew how…"

If that woman had only been able to experience true love from her husband… things would not have ended that way. If only she had had the courage to leave him without suicide, she could have moved on and finally found love with someone else.

I am not just talking about love for a lifetime partner, but love for friends, too. I love all my friends dearly, as do many other people on this earth. If the friends of everyone on earth realized just exactly how much they are loved – maybe not by a boyfriend or a girlfriend, but by their friends or parents – perhaps there would not be as many loveless suicides, suffering, and despair.

Love is such an important thing. Throughout life, you _need_ to discover love. If I could really have things my way, I would wish that everybody who had died without getting a chance to love or be loved would be brought back to life and given a second chance, just like Yusuke.

When Yusuke died, he did not know how loved he had been. From Keiko, from his mother, from even Kuwabara – Yusuke did not know. He was so willing when I had found him to just move on with the afterlife and leave this world where he thought no one cared about it. Of course now, he knows better. He has learned to recognize and appreciate the value of love, and he has even learned to love others. His love his so powerful, and it shows in the way he fights. When Yusuke is fighting to protect someone he loves, he fights with all he's got and doesn't give up.

And although he's never said this aloud, I know that he is glad for his second chance at life. His second chance at finding love.

And I am quite certain that others, if given another chance, would be grateful for it too.

**-X-**

-crazykitsune17-


	4. Chapter 4

A/N: Um… hi. This chapter is dedicated to SilverRoseOfDeath who surprised me by reviewing this and forcing me to remember what exactly this fic was about and why I loved writing it. Thank you.

**One Wish**

_by crazykitsune17_

Disclaimer: A lesson in possession: Yu Yu Hakusho belongs to Yoshihiro Togashi.

**-X-**

Wishes? I don't believe in wishes. It's just garbage that humans have come up with to try to make their pathetic lives that less miserable. It carries the same connotations to me as "love" and "friendship". They're not real.

I don't have time to be making wishes that won't come true. Nor do I have the stomach to wish for such frivolous things as "world peace" and other such nonsense.

I deal with what is known to me, nothing make believe. I never played "pretend" as a child as some of my other acquaintances; I killed and fought and stole just for the simple right to live. I have no time for fantasies. I will not waste my time with people who simply want to talk "what if".

Sure, I have wondered to myself "what if this happened" or "what if that happened" or "what if I was dead?", but what good does it do? None whatsoever. What happens, happens, what will happen will happen, and I am still alive, so why wonder.

Curiosity is a dangerous thing. You learn that when you have lived in Demon World as long as I have. That's why you don't go meddling in other peoples' business if you don't have to. That's why you don't pick fights with anybody if you don't have to. You can't do things on the spur of the moment in Makai because you're going to get hurt. It's not like in the human world, where if you're curious as a child, you are rewarded and considered "intelligent". No. In Demon World, you are only a burden if you present yourself to be too curious.

Which is why I simply cannot bring myself to be "curious" about "what I could wish for if given the opportunity". It is not a part of my nature.

And that should be the end of the story. But I'm sure no one is satisfied with such an answer, however logical and realistic it is. Perhaps I'd wish for humans to never be disappointed when you let them down through a lack of conversation. Nah. Let the humans suffer in their disappointment. What do I care?

I don't care. I don't care about the humans. Let them all die. Wouldn't that make a nice wish, hmm? No. Just leave them be, I suppose. They'll all die on their own anyway without my help.

Perhaps… I could wish for… not to feel so torn. Between the human world and the Makai. Between knowing what I want and knowing nothing at all. Between wanting to live and wanting to die. I have gone through all of these, and every time I am torn. Do I really need this? Do I really need that? Do I really need to waste my time with Urameshi and his team? Or am I allowed to just live freely as I wish? Do I even know what I wish?

Of course I don't. I am torn, didn't you just hear me? At times I even feel like the buffoon, in a constant of confusion. Except his is of a much more simple kind; he could not even begin to comprehend the level of… _confusion_ that I must dwell in every day.

Torn between desires… hopes… and other such frivolity. I say it is not my "style", not my way, but it's only the confusion seeping through my every word. It is simply easier to not want anything at all, yet I do burn with desire and hope and… many emotions unfamiliar to me. You simply just have no idea.

I wish I could know exactly, _exactly_ what I want. I have no patience for this constant wondering, being torn.

There. Now that I've said something, are you happy now and will you leave me alone so that I can contemplate some more on pointless questions?

**-X-**

-crazykitsune17


	5. Chapter 5

A/N: Sorry I haven't updated. Here is my list of excuses: grounded from the Internet, Harry Potter, registering for college, getting a second job, various leisure activities. Uh, enjoy! Thank you.

**One Wish**

_by crazykitsune17_

**-X-**

My life being the result of somebody else's wish, you'd think it'd be easy for me to believe in wishes. Truth is, I'm not much for fantasy.

Oh, you may think that running around with demons, spirits, ghosts, and whatever else comes my way is "fantasy", but it's just as real as I am here. Which I guess is pretty much unbelievable seeing as how I should be dead.

Oh well. The dead coming back to life is not so unusual in the world of Spirit Detectives. I happen to know a very lucky bastard who's done it twice.

Anyway… who wants to listen to an old hag ramble on about young little snotrags. You came here for your wishes. Fine. You'll get them.

I wish that people could appreciate their lives more. Life is a cycle. You're born, you grow up, you grow old, you die. It is a fact of life for most humans, and it should have been a fact of life for me, had I not been wished back. You may think I'm crazy, telling people to expect death and deal with it when so many I know, myself included, have accomplished the impossible and were given a second chance.

Well, not to rain on your parade or anything, but second chances aren't just handed out to anybody like door prizes. In fact, it's very rare that you're given a second chance at all! Most people don't live like we do, they live without any spiritual influence, they live in blissful ignorance of the entirely different worlds around them. They do not know afterlife. They do not know heaven and hell and purgatory; they have not been there, and they won't until they die. For real.

Back to my point. I seem to have grown much more talkative in my old age. Or perhaps I just seem that way because I'm so used to no one listening. In any case, I wish that people would appreciate their lives and not throw them away, like I have seen countless students and friends of mine do.

Take Yusuke for example. He was just a regular bum, nothing going for him in life, and certainly nothing going for him in death. During his early years as a Spirit Detective, I was disgusted by how lazy and apathetic he was. There was no _real_ desire to learn the proper handling of his own power. There was no real need for him… Sure, he helped out Koenma in a pinch, but the whole time, he was whiny and stupid and weak. At first, I thought he would be a total failure and go back to his lazy kid days, skipping class and picking fights with nobodies.

I was wrong, luckily.

As for other acquaintances… their stories aren't so cheerful.

When I was young, the younger Toguro brother and I would train ceaselessly to become the best fighters in the world. I knew my limits; Toguro, however, did not, and continued to push himself until he made the ultimate sacrifice – his humanity.

The moment he became a demon, I lost all respect for him and others like him. Being human is a gift, a gift that so few people realize. Sure, the human race is just a cesspool of filth and idiocy for the most part, but being a human with real limits and emotions and brains is something few people can see the beauty of.

So maybe mortality is not as glamorous as living a thousand years as a demon. So maybe it's not pretty when blood spews out of your nose after a punch to the face, and it's just easier to gain tough demon skin and never be hurt again. So maybe it sucks when you get your heart broken and you spend a night or two crying into your pillow while the whole world completely ignores you. But you know what? It's all a part of life. And if you're too weak to accept that… then I pity you.

Toguro was a fool. A fool and a coward, taking the easy way out with his inability to cope with age and loss. While we were once young and powerful, I became old – as nature intended – yet he continued to stay youthful and almighty. And look where that got him. Six feet under, same as me.

I just simply cannot respect someone who doesn't appreciate his humanity and throws his life away for something as stupid and unrewarding as immortality or power.

Now, I'm sure some of you are thinking to yourself, "Well, aren't you just a hypocrite, you exceeded your human limitations and came back from the dead! That's unnatural!" And yes. Yes it is. I'm not going to make excuses. I am not alive because I sold myself. I am alive because, well… I guess a bunch of other people just missed me. It's all circumstantial, really.

Would I rather be dead? To be honest, the little bit of the afterlife I saw wasn't that great. And apparently I'm still needed down here among the living.

But when that day comes when I must die – again – I will embrace it fully knowing that I have lived – and appreciated – all of my life… as a human.

**-X-**

-crazykitsune17


End file.
